Chateaubriand, upon my repeating the same description in the sequel of that correspondence, admitted it to be a question at once and equally toute francaise, et toute europeenne:  an explanation the exact meaning of which I acknowledge I do not precisely understand; but which, if it does not distinctly admit the definition of a, question francaise, seems at least to negative M. de Montmorency’s definition of a question TOUTE europeenne.

In thus unavoidably introducing the names of the French Ministers, I beg I may be understood to speak of them with respect and esteem.  Of M. de Montmorency I have already said that, in voluntarily relinquishing his office, he made an honourable sacrifice to the sincerity of his opinions, and to the force of obligations which he had undertaken but could not fulfil.  As to M. de Chateaubriand, with whom I have the honour of a personal acquaintance, I admire, his talents and his genius; I believe him to be a man of an upright mind, of untainted honour, and most capable of discharging adequately the high functions of the station which he fills.  Whatever I may think of the political conduct of the French Government in the present war, I think this tribute justly due to the individual character of M. de Chateaubriand.  I think it further due to him in fairness to correct a misrepresentation to which I have, however innocently, exposed him.  From a dispatch of Sir W. A’Court, which has been laid upon the table of the House, it appears as if M. de Chateaubriand had spoken of the failure of the mission of Lord F. Somerset as of an event which had actually happened, at a time when that nobleman had not even reached Madrid.  I have recently received a corrected copy of that dispatch, in which the tense employed in speaking of Lord F. Somerset’s mission is not past but future; and the failure of that mission is only anticipated, not announced as having occurred.

The dispatch was sent in cipher to M. Lagarde (from whom Sir W. A’Court received his copy of it), and nothing is more natural in such cases than a mistake in the inflection of a verb.

It is also just to the French Minister for Foreign Affairs, to allude (although it is rather out of place in this argument) to another circumstance, of which I yesterday received an explanation.  A strong feeling has been excited in this country by the reported capture of a rich Spanish prize in the West Indies by a French ship of war.  If the French captain had acted under orders, most unquestionably those orders must have been given at a time when the French Government was most warm in its professions of a desire to maintain peace.  If this had been the case, it might still perhaps be doubtful whether this country ought to be the first to complain.  Formal declarations of war, anterior to warlike acts, have been for some time growing into disuse in Europe.  The war of 1756, and the Spanish war in 1804, both, it must be